


Blood Feathered

by ermengarde



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Animal Transformation, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 19:53:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5678572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ermengarde/pseuds/ermengarde
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam’s having to make all the decisions, and he’s lonely, even though Dean rarely leaves his side.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blood Feathered

**Author's Note:**

> Repost of a very old fic from a now-locked journal - originally posted in 2007 
> 
> beta'd by: beckytheelf, pheebs1 (who did an extraordinary amount of tense wrangling, including rewriting half of it in a different tense) and elle_dritch.

As best they can figure, or as Sam can figure anyway, Dean’s some kind of raptor; probably a Golden Eagle, although his plumage is a little off for _A. c. Canadensis_. He looks a lot more noble than he did in his 6ft 1 human body, and his wingspan looks to be at least as wide as he used to be tall. Sam can’t say that the sharp talons combined with the even sharper eyesight haven’t come in useful during their hunts, but he misses _Dean_.

Not that Dean’s ever really left his side since he woke up avian, he’s only had to whistle and Dean’s _right there_ ; it’s easier than calling his brother’s cell phone ever was. Sam’s researched eagles until he could ace an exam on them and knows that Golden Eagles pair bond for life, and it looks like Dean’s bonded to Sam. 

That, at least, is comforting when Sam’s searching golden-brown eyes for a spark of Dean that no longer seems to be there.

**

At first Dean had kept to the motel room, subsisting on raw hamburger, while Sam had tried to find a way of reversing the curse that the dying, demonic priest had spat out as his last defiant stand against the Latin of their exorcism. But Dean had gotten increasingly agitated with the confined space as Sam had failed to turn up anything that might bring back his brother. 

A large eagle trying to swoop round your motel room concentrates the mind beautifully on mocking up permits to hold and transport a wild bird.

** 

It’s been nearly a year and while they don’t really communicate any more, while Sam’s not sure that Dean _can_ really communicate any more, they’ve developed an almost comfortable routine. Days that there’s no hunting to be done, Sam drives Dean far enough from whatever motel they’re staying at so that he can really soar, maybe catch something to eat. 

Dean just seems to know the days they’ve a hunt to go on which comforted Sam for a long time, believing that it meant Dean still understood him, but he’s sure now that it’s more to do with the pheromones he’s putting out than any real comprehension on his brother’s part. 

The days they’re travelling from one hunt to another are the best days for both of them; Sam driving the Impala, Dean’s music blasting, and Dean soaring overhead, riding the thermals, rejoining his brother with a heart-stopping plummet from the heights when the car pulls over two or three miles from civilisation.

Dean doesn’t fly much inside the motel rooms anymore; after knocking over any number of ugly lamps, he seems to have developed an odd little hopping half swoop to get from surface to surface without causing too much damage. 

Sam leaves the bathroom sink filled with water as much as he can, often blocking the drain with a sock or shirt, and he tries to buy meat any time he passes a butcher's. Money’s tight now; single motel rooms aren’t as much of a saving as he’d hoped and Sam’s never been as good as Dean at hustling for ready cash. 

Dean’s need to make an eyrie in every room they slept in had cost Sam too much money in the beginning. They had a system now though, a duffle filled with odd towels and clothes and plants that Sam spreads over the spare bed, or bedside table, of every room they stay in. Dean often picks at the pile, arranging it just so, occasionally discarding some item of clothing from the mix and selecting something new from Sam’s wardrobe before settling down to sleep, or at least settling down to glare at Sam until he turns out the lights.

**

Sam keeps trying to get Dean back, keeps looking for new information to research at every two-bit library they come across, but there’s never anything new. Nearly twelve months have passed, two hundred and fifty eight days, since Sam last had a conversation with his brother, and it’s not fair that he’s being left to make all the decisions. 

**  
Dean’s been more unsettled recently, fluttering and swooping whenever he’s enclosed, so Sam’s just been driving; starting soon after dawn and only stopping when it’s near dusk to let Dean come back to the car before it gets too dark for him to fly.

Sam’s exhausted, and tonight he just dumps Dean’s things out on the spare bed, barely pulling off his boots and jeans before falling into a deep, unsettled sleep.

**

Sam wakes, confused by the amount of light streaming into the motel room. Usually Dean lets him know that it’s dawn - time to get up and out - by landing on him and hopping heavily up and down on Sam’s legs until he gets the hint. By the brightness and heat of the sun through the blind Sam knows it must be more like ten or eleven o'clock in the morning. 

He sits up, seeing Dean’s nest intact on the other bed, the bathroom door half shut and a couple of feathers trailing a path between the two. Sam’s research had indicated that Dean will probably molt a couple of times before he becomes full grown – assuming that he’s been turned into an equivalently aged bird – and Sam has been waiting for it to happen for a while. He’s not been able to find out anything about how molting might affect Dean’s mood or hunting, and he’s concerned that it might be difficult. 

Pushing off the comforter, Sam rises and crosses the tiny floor space to the bathroom. He opens the door slowly, being careful not to startle Dean. _Dean_. 

Sam holds out an arm to steady himself against the cool tile of the bathroom wall; his brother is lying on the floor of the small room within a circle of feathers and blood. 

“Sammy…” Dean’s voice is little more than a clicking, dry rasp and he doesn’t open his eyes.

Sam falls to his knees, puts his hand out, afraid to touch the broken and bleeding skin, feathers embedded into Dean’s follicles like hair. “Dean, fuck… Dean.”

The floor’s a mess, the detritus of bird showing where Dean’s own human features, nose and hair and beard, have pushed through, loosening and expelling the bars of his unnatural prison.

Sam’s mind races. Dean’s molting, losing some of his adolescent coloring _what if this is only a transitional phase, a brief visit to human on the way to his more adult feathers?_ Sam’s not sure he can bear to be so alone and not alone again.

Dean’s panting quietly, as if the effort of even breathing is too much. “Hurts. Cold.” He’s shivering.

Sam lowers his hand gently and ghosts it over his brother’s back. Dean’s skin is icy cold and the heat from Sam’s palm raises goose bumps in its trail. 

Dean lets out a gentle sigh. “Good. S’good.” And Sam sees that his hand has left a path clear of feathers on Dean’s back. That the gentle movement has freed the sharp spines from Dean’s skin and left only tiny, gently bleeding wounds behind. 

“Dean, I have to get you warm… I…” Dean whimpers as Sam removes his hand. “Dean, I’m going to get you into the shower, okay?” Dean whimpers again, but the tone is different and Sam takes it as assent. 

The motel is old and the over-head spray weak, but hot, and Sam adjusts it to skin-warm before he strips off his T-shirt and bends down to help Dean up and into the shallow tub. Dean groans as Sam all but lifts him, and he barely uncurls from the foetal position he’s been in on the floor.

**

Sam sits with his back to the spray, holding Dean practically on his lap, shielding him from the weak flow of water. 

He sits, stroking his brother for a long time, rubbing warmth into frozen skin and easing out the last of the feathers. The tiny room fills with the warm, soothing steam and the drain of the bath almost clogs with sodden feathers. Eventually Dean stops shivering. 

 

Dean isn’t small, has never been small, but sitting like this - tucked into Sam’s chest, almost burrowing his head into his younger brother’s neck - Sam feels he is no larger now than he had been as an eagle. The needy whimpering Dean’s making sounds so much like the hungry noises he had made when there had been no meat or hunting for a few days that Sam has to pull back a little and really look at Dean to make sure he’s still human. 

Sam just stares at his brother. He had forgotten how beautiful Dean is; apparently keeping in shape as an eagle has kept him in good shape as a human too. Sam can’t remember Dean ever looking so perfect, even though he’s sporting a thousand bloody pin pricks all across his skin. Dean’s half-vocalised _need, want_ only intensifies as Sam holds away from him. As Sam continues to lean back behind the water spray, just looking, Dean turns slightly in Sam’s embrace and reaches up.

Sam allows Dean to pull his head down, giving in to the gentle pressure on the back of his neck from Dean’s insistent hand. He continues his soft caress of his brother’s mistreated skin and when he looks down again, he sees that Dean has finally opened his eyes; his beautiful green eyes, the pupils blown wide in the dim light of the room.

“Dean…” Whatever Sam had been going to say is lost in his brother’s embrace as Dean pulls him down again and captures his open mouth in a kiss. 

Gentle and warm and _Dean_. 

**

 _What? This isn’t…. This is_ Dean . _He’s kissing Dean_. 

Sam pulls up a little, breaking their kiss, and Dean lets out a little, broken whine and tries to pull him back down. 

Sam can hardly bear to keep looking at Dean, seeing the hurt expression cross his face. 

“Mine.” Dean almost-whispers, his voice cracking. “Sammy. Mine.”

And he is. Utterly Dean’s, just as Dean belongs to him. And maybe they shouldn’t do this. Maybe they should just go back to how they were. But maybe Dean will be soaring wild and free again tomorrow and Sam will be left back in his half-life with not-Dean. 

Sam is already damned; a target for the demon. Destined for things much worse than the living hell of the last year, although he really can’t work out what they could be. 

“Yes, Dean. Yours.” 

And this time, their kiss isn’t sweet and soft. It is hard and desperate and full of need, water pouring over their heads and filling the feather strewn tub.


End file.
